


Industrial Revelations

by Lancre_witch



Category: Legacy of Kain
Genre: Gen, Janos gets a brief scene but it's not a happy one, OC-centric, almost all the glyph energy jargon was stolen from discworld, almost entirely hylden ocs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-05
Updated: 2018-04-05
Packaged: 2019-04-18 19:28:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,623
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14220153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lancre_witch/pseuds/Lancre_witch
Summary: Scenes from Nosgoth's industrial revolution.The first hylden through the portal were the engineers and mages, those whose freedom could pave the way for others. The next through were the soldiers at the order of Hask’ak’gik, for their people could not live in a world where vampires ruled. Third were the medics and doctors because the war had been hard fought and bloody, and in this plane pain could be healed.





	1. Chapter 1

Jah’ay’lah was one of the first through after the capture of Meridian. She had been given staff, demons, funds, and a single order – find a method of channelling the Ma’sass’gah. The humans, unfamiliar with their tongue called it the Mass. She simply thought of it as the key to their freedom. If all vampires fell, surely their curse would die with them. The work had been hard and dangerous, but now she had a solution.

The entire hylden council had squashed themselves into Jah’ay’lah’s small office to hear this speech. She hoped it wouldn’t disappoint.

 “My lords, as you know,” she began in the time honoured tradition of those who suspect their superiors do not know what is about to be explained, “The demons’ magic, so easily harnessed on their own plane has proved incredibly resistant to the same here. Until now. As we suffered and changed in a realm that was not our own, so their magic falters. I deduce that for anything to thrive in another world, that world must be isorational.” She looked at the sea of blank faces. “That is to say, they need to have the same level of reality.” More blank looks. “In the same way that the souls of the dead go to the spectral realm unless they are trapped here, the demon’s magic fades to their own once free of the confines of their flesh. Yes?”

The general at the back lowered his hand. “Does this mean demons are useless here?”

“Not any more, sir, because” – she pulled back the cloth with a flourish – “of these. The glass bulbs and copper pipes have all been tempered with demon flame, lowering their rationality index to that of the concentrated ichor inside. When this lever is released, a trickle of magic is released down the rationality gradient and along the pipes. Observe.”

Jah’ay’lah pulled said lever and the pipes started rattling, wisps of green steam escaping from welding joints. “Now if we follow its progress over to here. The filament in the bulb has a higher rationality index, but still lower than Nosgoth’s base RI – that is to say, rationality index,” she said to the once again puzzled faces.

The light switched on, filling the room with a sickly green glow. “We’re still working on filter to cut down the side effects,” Jah’ay’lah added apologetically.

“We didn’t employ you to find a replacement for candles,” someone grumbled.

“Oh, the light bulb is just for demonstration purposes. The “glyph pipes” can cast a web of magic wherever they are laid. If we installed the network across the land, the vampires would be killed with a single thought.”

“And you think the humans won’t be suspicious? They may be weak and foolish creatures, but surely they’re not that stupid.”

“Suspicious of what?” another asked him. “This wonderful new magic which does away with candles, can turn night into day? They will be clamouring for it.”


	2. Chapter 2

“So because vampires live or rather un-live with the curse-”

“They have a different RI to everything else in Nosgoth!”

“All we need to do is find it!”

Several long arguments and some mild injuries later they had a small vial of blood and an enemy for life by the name of Faustus.

“How is it higher? How is that possible?” Ak’ash’grah tapped the resograph to check the needle wasn’t stuck, but it resolutely bounced around the 1800mr mark.

“I think we can thank the separation from their god for that.” Hak’shish had her own theories on the vampires’ dark god, but now was not the time for them. “It doesn’t really matter, but it does make our job easier.”

“We can arc it round, increase the rationality across the barrier to the Nosgothic constant and prevent everything but vampires from passing through.”

“Just one problem – how do we test it?”

“Depends. How brave are you feeling?”

 

This was just a mock-up, but quite a good one nevertheless. Ak’ash’grah and Hak’shish had set up a glyph box in a disused side room in the industrial quarter and had spent half the afternoon stringing wires around the corridor. Two precariously stacked towers of magically imbued glass and pipes, buffers, dampers, amplifiers, and all the other skulduggery of the Glyph Rite’s trade had been constructed around the door.

“Right, try turning it on again.”

The green barrier flickered into life and Ak’ash’grah cautiously stepped into it. He didn’t immediately jump back screaming, so that could definitely be called a success. “Let me grab a human to test it on – oh bugger.”

The ward flicked on and off a few more times, then died completely. Hak’shsish wandered out a couple of minutes later with a soldering iron in her hand. “Dodgy connection. Still.” She sighed. “Go and grab someone, I’ll have got it done by the time you get back.”

Said someone walked through the ward gate without issue, then left hurriedly with an apology. Sebastian would be back on the hour and he didn’t like people away from their posts.

 

Sebastian stalked the industrial quarter, picking fault with everything and everyone. Whoever had left two piles of junk half blocking the corridor was going to regret it. He started to walk past them when he was thrown backwards by the green barrier which had sprung up between them.

Aching and swearing, he hauled himself onto his feet and snarled at the two Glyph Rites celebrating on the other side of the barrier.

Ak’ash’grah looked up at a sizzling noise from the pipes. Something sparked inside one of the stacks, a bulb broke, and the ward failed as the glass tinkled to the ground.

Sebastian stepped forward. “Run,” he suggested softly.

They looked from the vampire to the broken ward gate and back again. They ran.


	3. Chapter 3

Ha’gash’gah hovered nervously next to her chair as the old lady inspected his torn clothes by the light of a single candle, grateful that his human guise hid his face. “Mrs Harewood?”

She raised her head. “I charges tuppence an hour for them things as I can fix, and I won’t even try with them as I know I can’t. My eyes aren’t what they were for doing lace this fine.” She passed back a couple of garments and sighed. “Such a pity I can’t pass them on to my niece. Very pretty lace work she used to do. She’s no time for that now, working for those glyph merchants every hours the gods send. Such a clever girl.”

“But I notice you don’t have any glyph pipes in the house.”

“Oh, I can’t be having with that sort of thing, an old lady like me.” She gestured her sewing. “This pays for candles and food. It won’t pay for glyphs.”

“If it was free, would you get it? I’m a Glyph Rite. I can install it for you right off the mains.”

“Thank you, dear, but I would prefer my payment in coins. You can’t eat glyph pipes.”

*

Ha’gash’gah shut the door to his quarters and leaned against it. He had never known anyone so beaten down by the world. Not by this world at any rate. He remembered his great aunt Grash’ask’ir, who had spent all her time in needlecraft; at least, all her time in the world. Afterwards, she hadn’t cared much for anything. He had seen the same in grey, half blind eyes this evening. She knew her future and had accepted it. Weaving and knitting and sewing with failing hands until her life slipped away from her like thread falling from the eye of a too large needle. She may have accepted it, but Ha’gash’gah hadn’t.

His eyes fell on the knitted blanket on his bed, a gift from his great aunt a few years before she died, and stared at it as if seeing it for the first time. He picked it up and looked closer. Loops upon loops upon loops.

*

Janice looked up as the young man practically fell through her door.

“Mrs Harewood!”

“They’ll be done by Wednesday. If you wanted something done urgently you should have said.”

Ha’gash’gah paused while he shifted mental gears. “No, Wednesday- Wednesday’s good. Do you sell wool?”

“There’s a haberdasher’s on Flinting Street. They’ll be open tomorrow at ten.” She looked pointedly at the darkening sky outside the window.

“Oh. Right. Thank you.”

He stumbled out and tried not to feel hurt when he heard the door being locked behind him.

*

“Bugger. Ow! Ha’drak!”

Shir’kar listened for a moment, then put her head around Ha’gash’gah’s door. “Oh, my poor innocent ears. What’s got you in such a state?”

Ha’gash’gah grinned sheepishly and held up a ragged looking woollen – she peered closer – pentagon?

“Nope, I still don’t follow. Care to give us a clue, Gash?”

“Knitting. Very badly, I hasten to add,” he said as his sister started giggling.

“Good luck with that.”

*

The next time Shir’kah dropped by, the knitting needles had been abandoned in favour of the oddest loom she had ever seen. She was sure they didn’t usually have a row of crochet hooks on the top.

“I’d like your opinion on this,” Ha’gash’gah said as he pulled it into the middle of the room. “Do you think something like this could be glyph powered?”

“Depends. What is it?”

“Watch.”

He threaded an awl with some difficulty, then slotted it into the side. “Pull the wool across this gap here, then this row of hooks goes down.” He paused for a moment to rearrange one which had spun around. “ _Now_ the hooks turn around and catch the wool. They go back _up_.” He rattled at the handle for a moment. “Bugger. Forgot to turn it. Right. Turn them sideways and pull back up.”

“Congratulations. You’ve looped two bits of wool together.”

“Shut up and watch.”

Shir’kah watched as her brother cursed and muttered his way through another few cycles of the machine, then stood back proudly.

“A knitting loom? Okay, I’m actually impressed. Drag that thing down to the factory Tuesday and we’ll do a better mock-up. Then we’ll think about who to take the design to.”

*

Some months later, Janice was startled by a knock on the door.

“Sorry. I know you said you didn’t want linking up to the glyph network, but it’s all got out of hand.”

She stared blankly at the man in the doorway, hoping he would soon start making sense.

“Oh, you probably don’t remember me. You mended some clothes for me last year and I-”

“Yes, I remember that. What I don’t understand is why you’ve come bursting into my house.”

“Ah, right. Well, you remember the yarn?”

Several hours and cups of tea later, Ha’gash’gah was still trying to explain. His human guise had failed long before the candle guttered out, but thankfully she was too blind to see him for what he was. “…and then someone said it all comes down to numbers. Zeroes and ones. I don’t understand it either, but now they have these cards.” He handed a punch card. “And they can do colours now and we’re still working on increasing and decreasing. I meant to help people like you, but it’s just going to take work away from you. I’m sorry,” he finished in a rush.

Janice patted his hand. “Drink your tea, it’ll be going cold. Now about this glyph malarkey, what did you say is going to happen?”

“I can get the workmen in tomorrow and we can get you connected for lights, heating, and one of the mark 1 knitting looms.”

“Won’t that cost a lot?”

“Nothing! It won’t cost you anything. I’ve fucked this up so badly, this is the least I can do.”

*

Shir’kah walked into his office without knocking. “Gash, there’s a parcel for you!”

“Thank you.”

When she made no move to leave or relinquish the parcel, Ha’gash’gah snatched it from her and elbowed her out the door. Locking it behind him, he tore off the brown paper and something soft and deep blue fell into his lap.

After being held up at a few different angles, it revealed itself to be a robe of hylden style, machine knitted. There was no name on the parcel, but half hidden in the paper he found a square of card on which a crabbed hand had written, _It’s the least I can do to thank you._


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one gets a bit dark. I'm sorry, Janos.

“Roll your shoulder… Now forwards… Tilt your neck to the left… And the right… Alright, you’ll do.”

Ba’jak’ha pinned the bandage in place and continued. “You won’t lose any movement in the joint and you haven’t lost too much blood. What the hell did you two do to piss off a vampire that badly?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Hak’shish muttered. “Is Ak’ash’grah alright?”

“She will be. Come back in a fortnight to have the stitches out. Now go.”

Ba’jak’ha rubbed his temples as his patient left. He had thought life would be easier in this plane, but the demon realm hadn’t had glyph magic. Since the network had been installed in the city his workload had doubled. Some of the things a faulty line could do to a body almost made him wish he had never come through the gate. At least, until he remembered the screams in the night, then nothing could make him wish he was back there.

“What?” he snapped as the door slid open.

“Doctor Ba’jak;ha?’You’re wanted at Device.”

Thoughts of glyph explosions still running through his mind, he grabbed his bag and followed.

*

Ba’jak’ha made no move towards the body lying in a ring of ward gates. “I thought they were all dead,” he said.

“It’s not the sort of thing we want to be general knowledge. He’ll join the rest of his degenerate race soon enough, but for now we need him alive.”

“And the reason for that is…?”

“Classified.”

“Of course it is.” He sighed in resignation and approached the blue figure sprawled on the floor.

Preliminary tests were not good. “How much blood have you been extracting?”

The guard shrugged. “They take a couple of vials a day, I think.”

“Do you also think that a member of a species that relies on blood can produce an infinite supply of it?”

He looked at the guard’s blank face. “If you need his blood, he needs someone else’s. Go get some. We can work out a more permanent solution when he’s conscious. I assume that’s necessary?”

Another shrug. “I heard some high up say he hoped the bastard suffers, but I don’t think that counts as an order.”

Ba’jak’ha thought back to screams in the dark, pain no analgesic could touch, bodies and souls being warped in an alien plane. “I’m taking it as one.”

*

“Ha!” Ba’jak’ha dropped the medical journal in triumph. The drug trials had been discontinued for ethical reasons, but he could probably wrangle an exception to the ban, given the circumstances. It was a pity to let good blood go to waste on his newest ‘patient’.

*

“Are we going to go through this every week?”

“Are you going to insist on injecting me with that vile stuff every week?” Janos managed, somewhat impeded by his lengthened teeth.

“Of course.” Ba’jak’ha smiled nastily. “We can’t have you starving, now, can we?”

Janos groaned and started crawling away. Ba’jak’ha rolled his eyes and followed, catching a leg easily as the Ancient tried to kick him. He ignored the yelp as the needle found a vein and help him still until the needled was fully depressed.

A quiet sob, just on the edge of hearing, and the hylden hid a twisted smile. He had known so much pain in his life, but this was different. This was vengeance.


End file.
